“They are everywhere and close,” he whispered quickly, as the running figure came on toward us, “breaking out into visible manifestation even. Hold yourself strong and steady. Remember, your attitude of mind and feeling are important. Each detail of behaviour is significant.”
His anxiety, I realised, was for us, not for himself. Already, it seemed, our souls were playing vital rôles in some great dramatic ceremonial just beginning. What we did and felt and thought was but a partial expression of something going forward with pregnant completeness behind the visible appearances all round. Mrs. LeVallon stood breathless in front of us. She was hatless, her hair becomingly dishevelled; her arms bare to the elbow and white with flour. She stopped, placed her hands upon her hips, and panted for a full minute before she could get breath enough to speak. Her eyes, a deep, luminous sea-green, looked into ours. Her face was pale, yet the emotion was excitement rather than alarm. I was aware of a superb, nymph-like grace and charm about her. I caught my breath. Julius made no movement, spoke no word. I wondered. I made a step forward to catch her. But she did not fall; she merely sank down upon the ground at our feet.
“Julius,” she panted, “that thing I’ve dreamed about so often——”
She stopped short, glancing up at me, the eyes, charged with a sweet agitation, full upon my own. I turned to Julius with a gesture of uncontrollable impatience.
He spoke calmly, sitting down on the slope beside her. “You felt it again—the effect of your vivid dreaming? Or did you this time—see anything?”
The swiftness and surprise of the little scene had been bewildering, but the moment he spoke confusion and suspense both vanished. The sound of his quiet voice restored the threatened balance. Peace came back into the sunlight and the air. There was composure again.
“You certainly were not frightened!” he added, as she made no reply. “You look too happy and exhilarated for that.” He put his hand on hers.
I sat down then beside her, and she turned and looked at me with a pathetic mingling of laughter and agitation still in her wide-opened eyes. The three of us were close together. He kept his hand on hers. Her shoulder touched me. I was aware of something very wonderful there between us. We comforted her, but it was more, far more, than that. There was sheer, overflowing happiness in it.
“It came into the house,” she said, her breath recovered now, and her voice gentle. “It follered me—out here. I ran.” She looked swiftly round at me. The radiance in her face was quite astonishing, turning her almost beautiful. Her eyelids quivered a moment and the corners of her lips seemed trying to smile—or not to smile. She was happy there, sitting between us two. Yet there was nothing light or foolish in her. Something of worship rose in me as I watched her.